The Swell Season—Radio City Music Hall

Clearly if you've read this blog, you know that I adore the movie Once. So I naturally jumped at the chance to see the movie's stars perform with their band, The Swell Season, at Radio City Music Hall. Alison, who spent $12 on a martini glass that had a pair of rocketette's legs as a stem, and I had pretty swell (tee hee) seats. However, we were late and missed the opener, which was The Interference who happen to join them in the movie and sing the song "Gold." Not to worry, they came back and joined Glen Hansard for that song later in the show. Obviously the concert was fabulous and in the interest of not droning on and on, I'll try and be concise.

Highlights:
The first song was "Say it to Me Now," and Hansard sang it acoustic with no mic. I'm sure the people at the very top in the back couldn't hear him but it's their fault for not having seats as good as ours. When he belts the first line of the chorus, I get goosebumps and my attraction to him grows and grows.

After the first song, when Marketa joined Hansard on stage they seemed quite overwhelmed by their venue. At one point Hansard says the first time they played in New York, they were thrilled to have sold out Pianos, which is a tiny bar/music venue on the Lower East Side that I've been to and loved, so having sold out Radio City was very surreal to them both. Cue cheers!

At one point during the first few songs, Hansard stopped to apologize for his language, blaming it on the fact that his Irish decent makes Irish folk want to fuck up the English language at every opportunity, hence all the cursing. Awesome.

Clearly, I teared up at several points during the show. Most notably during "When Your Mind's Made Up," "Leave" and Oscar winner "Falling Slowly." Also, Hansard kept turning back the piano and giving Marketa loving looks. They are so damn cute, it's almost to the point of being ridiculous.

Hansard did a cover of Van Morrison's Astral Weeks and it was fucking insane. People literally lost their minds at this point.

Marketa brought her sister up on stage to sing a song with her. While it was an incredibly cute gesture, the song they chose to sing was very strange. It was called "Gently Johnny" and it was from the movie Wicker Man. Just . . . weird.

A choice favorite quote referring to the chance they took with the music from Once:
"A couple years ago, we decided to kick our ball as hard as we could, and see how far it would go," Hansard said. "We were hoping it would reach the end of the garden, but we watched it go … across the street, over the next town, into a place we’d never even heard of before. And the great thing about (nights like this) is that it sort of quiets the 1% of you that wishes you could have your ball back."

During one song that included a violin solo, the violinist took the song into an unexpected but amazing place by launching into "Pure Imagination" from the original Willy Wonka & The Chocolate Factory. Hansard, who looked caught off guard but pleased, rolled with it and sang a bit of the Gene Wilder classic.

They did not one, not two but three encores because they didn't want the night to end and the crowd loved them all. They ended the night with another Van Morrison cover of "Into the Mystic."

Verdict: One of the best nights I've spent in New York. Also, I clearly can't be concise about things that I love so much.

Edit: Alison would like the mention of her glass purchase to reflect the fact that the $12 bought her the glass, which was filled with a strong strawberry daiquiri. She did not spend $12 on the glass alone.